Showing results by narrator "Jesse Bernstein" in All Categories

Welcome to Other Worlds, the fourth volume in the Guys Read Library. Prepare yourself for 10 trips into the unknown, as 10 of your favorite writers spin tales of fantasy and science fiction the likes of which you have never imagined. Compiled by National Ambassador for Children's Literature (and Secret Ambassador for the Intergalactic Alliance) Jon Scieszka, Guys Read: Other Worlds is the most exciting collection of stories on this - or any other - planet.

When seventh grader Georges (the S is silent) moves into a Brooklyn apartment building, he meets Safer, a 12-year-old coffee-drinking loner and self-appointed spy. Georges becomes Safer's first spy recruit. His assignment? Tracking the mysterious Mr. X, who lives in the apartment upstairs. But as Safer becomes more demanding, Georges starts to wonder: how far is too far to go for your only friend? Liar & Spy is an inspired, often-funny story about destiny, goofy brilliance, and courage.

Leo has explored the zany, wonderful Whippet Hotel from basement to top floor, with trains, flying goats, and mazes (among other things) in between. But even Leo doesn't know every secret of the Whippet and when he discovers that there's more beneath the hotel than he'd thought, it doesn't take long for more adventures to unfold!

When 13-year-olds Aaron and Audrey meet at a wilderness camp in the desert, they think their quirks are enough to prevent them from ever having friends. But as they trek through the challenging and unforgiving landscape, they learn that they each have what it takes to make the other whole.

Rufus has been dreaming of getting a dog. His best friend has one. His worst friend has one. But his dad has a few objections: They whine. They gnaw. They bark. They scratch. They beg. They drool. Rufus pays no attention when his mom offers her think-outside-the-box suggestion, because she can't be serious. She can't be. She can be. And she actually comes home with a guinea pig. And if Rufus's dad thinks dogs are a problem, he won't know what hit him when he meets the Guinea Pig that thinks she's a dog.

In the collection's title story, a pack of girls raised by wolves are painstakingly reeducated by nuns. In "Haunting Olivia", two young boys make midnight trips to a boat graveyard in search of their dead sister, who set sail in the exoskeleton of a giant crab. In "Sleepaway Camp for Disordered Dreamers", a boy whose dreams foretell implacable tragedies is sent to a summer camp for troubled sleepers (Cabin 1, Narcoleptics; Cabin 2, Sleep Apneics; Cabin 3, Somnambulists . . . ).

Ellie spent the summer before seventh grade getting dropped by her best friend since forever. Jack spent it training in "The Cage" with his tough-as-nails brothers and hard-to-please dad. By the time middle school starts, they're both ready for a change. And just as Jack's thinking girls have it so easy, Ellie's wishing she could be anyone but herself. Then, BAM! They swap lives - and bodies!

Everyone knows there are different kinds of teachers. The boring ones, the mean ones, the ones who try too hard, the ones who stopped trying long ago. The ones you'll never remember and the ones you want to forget. Ms. Bixby is none of these. She's the sort of teacher who makes you feel like school is somehow worthwhile. Who recognizes something in you that sometimes you don't even see in yourself. Who you never want to disappoint. What Ms. Bixby is is one of a kind.

Waverly Camdenmar spends her nights running until she can't even think. Then the sun comes up, life goes on, and Waverly goes back to her perfectly hateful best friend, her perfectly dull classes, and the tiny, nagging suspicion that there's more to life than student council and GPAs. Marshall Holt is a loser. He drinks on school nights and gets stoned in the park. He is at risk of not graduating; he does not care; he is no one. He is not even close to being in Waverly's world.

So, life sucks just about as much as it possibly can. And when I see gargoyles heading straight for me, all I'm left wondering is who will kill me first - the winged monster-hunters, or the angry sea dragons? What I don't expect? The gargoyles don't know who or what I am. So maybe, just maybe, if I can hide my identity long enough, I'll survive. But it might take a little distraction to accomplish. The thing is, I don't think I mind distracting four hard-as-stone gargoyles who can't stop staring.

Before a surfing accident caused 33-year-old Devon Raney to lose all but 15 percent of his vision, he had already lived an extraordinary life. Time and again, he'd gone against the grain to maximize time for his passions - surfing, skateboarding, and snowboarding - bringing him into the direct path of colorful characters, unexpected adventures, and even the occasional brush with death. Through it all, Devon's commitment to outdoor adventure never wavered.

Sebastian, a lonely 17-year-old, is suffocating under his dominant father's control. In the 10 years since his mother passed away, his father has kept him "safe" by barely allowing him out of their apartment. Sebastian's secret late-night subway rides are rare acts of rebellion.

This is a story about me, Lily. And me, Jake. We're twins and we're exactly alike. Not exactly! Whatever. This is a book we wrote about the summer we turned eleven and Jake ditched me. Please. I just started hanging out with some guys in the neighborhood. Right. So anyway, this is a book about: Goobers and supergoobers. Bullies. Clubhouses. True friends. Things getting built and wrecked and rebuilt. And about figuring out who we are.

When his classmates learn about Fido, the guinea pig that acts like a dog, they all want a piece of Rufus, her owner. But Rufus hates the attention, the demands, the "celebrity." So he decides to make Fido learn how to be an actual guinea pig. But when she goes missing, he feels terrible. Was she lost, "dognapped," or did she run away, because he no longer liked her just the way she was? Offering the same offbeat humor and pacing of the first Guinea Dog, this novel will prove to be a listener's best friend.

Jake Carlson, a correspondent for the TV news show American Outrage, inhabits a world of sensational trials and crazed celebrities. One of the nation's top television journalists, he's used to dragging himself through the dirt to get to the truth. When his adopted son, Sam, asks him to use his muckraking talents to find his birth mother, Jake is stunned by the ugly secrets he unearths.

In this genre-defying story from Lygia Day Peñaflor, four teens befriend their favorite YA novelist, only to find their deepest, darkest secrets in the pages of her next book - with devastating consequences. Miri Tan loved the book Undertow like it was a living being. So when she and her friends went to a book signing to hear the author, Fatima Ro, they concocted a plan to get close to her. Told as a series of interviews, journal entries, and segments from the book within the book - this gripping story of a fictional scandal will keep you on the edge of your seat.

The Spaghetti is a floating palace of elegance and entertainment. There's only one problem: Miss LaPasta doesn't want Barnabas Brambles to come aboard, because she's heard he's the meanest man alive. Lucky for Barnabas Brambles, his boss is Sir Sidney, the nicest man alive.

It's July in New York City, and aspiring filmmaker Wes Auckerman has just arrived to start his summer term at NYU. While shooting a séance at a psychic's in the East Village, he meets a mysterious, intoxicatingly beautiful girl named Annie.

All Dylan wants is mojo. What is mojo? It's power. The ability to command respect. It's everything Dylan doesn't have. He gets no respect at school, and when he finds the dead body of a classmate, even the police push him around. All the thanks he gets for trying to help the investigation with his crime-drama skills is a new nickname at school: Body Bag. So when Dylan hears about a missing rich girl from the other side of town, he jumps at the chance to dive into this mystery. Surely if he cracks a case involving a girl this beautiful and this rich, he'll get the mojo he's looking for.

Classified Ads - Wanted: Personal assistant to Her Royal Highness. Duties: Whatever asked without hesitation, including but not limited to secretarial/administrative, household, defense, blood donation, driving, companionship, prey disposal, and love slavery. At last, Miranda is the life of the party: All she had to do was die. Elevated and adopted by none other than the reigning King of the Mantle of Dracul, Miranda goes from high-school theater wannabe to glamorous royal fiend overnight.